


Unspoken

by alternateus



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Feelings, Grief/Mourning, Other, Pining, Possibly Unrequited Love, caleb hates himself, set immediately after molly's death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-29 14:42:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20437736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alternateus/pseuds/alternateus
Summary: Caleb had feelings for Molly, and it's too late to say anything.





	Unspoken

**Author's Note:**

> I've been a critter for a whopping two weeks and just came out of episode 29 and had some very late feelings to write out.

The wagons of the Iron Shepherds move along—slowly, recollecting themselves, but the pace brings no comfort to Caleb; it only drags out the moment, prolonging the freezing panic keeping his whole body locked in place as his mind tries to find something solid to grapple on as his whole core can do nothing but the absolute minimum required to live: stand still, not move a muscle, not breathe in as the sight of Mollymauk’s blood colouring the falling snow reminds him of the price of a wrong move. For as long as the caravan is still in sight, there’s still more to lose, and there’s not a moment that goes by as they hold on to the quietness that the blue eyes turned hollow aren’t picturing an arrow or a spell or the glaive going through whomever first dares to cross the path. Caleb’s skin is burning, every unspoken emotion hammering at his skin from the inside with hot iron, and yet the cold of the grief settles in him for long enough to paralyse him.

Three words threaten to choke him. Three words he never said, three words he never wanted to say out loud for as long as there was anything in this cursed world—be it Lorenzo, Ithikon, or the whole damn Empire if it came to that—that could bring punishment upon them if he ever said them out loud.

_I—…_

Beau is stronger than him—of course, she is, Caleb has long known that—as she breaks from the chokehold of terror and grief that’s keeping them upright, her shock coming out as grieving rage as she lunges at Keg. It breaks the spell, causes something to move forward; they’re released, but now Caleb has to stand on his own again, without the unwanted survival instinct keeping him locked in place. He can’t walk, yet, not for several moments, and he’s internally grateful for Beau’s screaming and crying because it keeps something alive in a moment that would otherwise still.

They bury Mollymauk, “shine bright, circus man” having to do as a farewell where other words fail the task. Molly’s memory doesn’t deserve what he really wants to say, nor do the rest of the Nein—Caleb was a coward, doing no better at the face of his feelings than he does at a battlefield, but without the excuse of logistics to hold him up; he built this weight, he alone should carry it.

_I love—…_

“I want you to say it.” Nott is right as she pushes him, and there’s nothing he can say about his feelings towards the captured three, or the remaining two, or the fallen one that he can keep in secrecy. The familiar burn for vengeance veils his expression—it’s not enough to keep it from Nott, and he doesn’t think it’s fooling Beau either anymore—and it keeps his mouth shut, only words about anything but his feelings passing through. He knows what Nott wants to hear; the answer is ready in him, the same one Nott had given… But it doesn’t come out. No, there’s still another answer, another sentence that’s in the way, burning his throat and helping him swallow down the pressure. How could he say about Yasha and Fjord and Jester what he couldn’t say to Molly?

They’d be worthy of it—love, in general, if not specifically the fucked-up, twisted beyond recognition version that’s all Caleb has to offer—but he isn’t. He has no right to say out loud now what Mollymauk had every right to hear, what his own cowardice and ridiculous hope of overcoming every obstacle that’d come in the way before that had prevented from giving to him, and it’s that guilt that gives him a gag stronger than any of the others he’d held in his mouth during the years.

Nott presses on, and Caleb has to walk away from it before the fire he feels carving at his skin will burn through his clothes. Before he breaks again.

Why do I go with you, he’d asked out loud into the cold air, and listed every reason he’d think of as to why he should go. Not out loud, he’d heard the answer loud and clear, and silenced it, keeping to his promise to not say it again for someone the world could rip apart.

And the world had done that, and now he’d one day be buried with the truth that’d belonged to Mollymauk.

_I love you._


End file.
